Thanks a bunch for all the advice so far. The ES-9 looks great; I’d probably default to that for CV to/from my laptop. Given unlimited funds and time, I could happily assemble a big old rack of hardware for making music with or without VCV Rack, but currently I make all my music in VCV Rack and so if I make the jump to buying Eurorack modules, I’d like to start with modules that add something new to that experience so that I can enjoy using them even if I’ve only got around to buying two or three modules, but that I could potentially integrate into a stand-alone rack someday. I’ll probably never stop using VCV Rack though, with all the things I do that wouldn’t be practical using hardware (like lots of duplicates of a module that would be large and expensive as hardware, or smoothly animating things in VCV Sound Stage).
I do have a MIDI keyboard controller—an Arturia MiniLab MkII I bought used, which has drum pads and a bunch of knobs—and it really does add a nice tactile element when I want to improvise a melody or do some fine adjustment of knobs or trigger something “live” while recording. And I’ve also tried pulling in audio from the headphones jack on my cheap portable cassette player for interesting effects. What I like about Ears is that it straddles the line between audio source and tactile gate/CV controller…
In terms of non-Eurorack modular, the Ciat Lonbarde Plumbutter is especially interesting to me…
Anyhow, I’m not buying any of this until after I’ve bought a house. Music is great, but I’ve got priorities 